Britain's service industries had a strong start to the year, according to official figures
The UK has avoided a triple dip recession, business group the British Chamber of Commerce (BCC) has said.
It believes a strong performance by Britain's service industries during the first three months of the year has kept the economy growing.
The weakness of the pound has also given exports a boost, it said.
The BCC's survey of more than 7,000 firms also showed improvements in the manufacturing sector, although employment had weakened.
David Kern, BCC chief economist, said the results suggested the economy continued to grow in the first three months of 2013.
"The survey reinforces our assessment that recent gross domestic product (GDP) figures published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) have exaggerated the weakness of the UK economy and the volatility in output," he said.
"If an announcement of negative growth in the first quarter is misleadingly described as a triple-dip recession, confidence will again be damaged unnecessarily."
Official GDP figures for the first quarter do not come out until later this month.
However, the Office for National Statistics has already provided figures for the service industry that showed growth of 0.8% for the first quarter.
If that can offset performance by manufacturers and construction, Britain may have avoided going into another technical recession.
John Longworth, director general of the BCC, said its figures suggest a "long and tortuous road to recovery".
"These results provide a glimpse of the as-yet-distant sunlit uplands of recovery.
"Businesses up and down the country are working hard to drive the economy, create jobs and export, but they cannot accelerate this process alone," Mr Longworth said.
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